Brief Profile:
Putting this up because I figured it might be helpful to fellow MIT premeds. Based on the stats the premed office publicizes, I'm a solidly average "successful" MIT applicant. I took the MCAT in August my sophomore summer after working in a lab part-time and studying most of the summer.
**Lessons learned: Don't add or cut schools from your list just because other people tell you to. I applied to too many random schools because the premed office kept saying to add more, and that turned out to be a huge waste of money because I ended up getting invites at all the places on my original list and not from the ones I tacked on. The premed office gives out a lot of good advice, but not all of it will apply to everyone. As long as you're not too cocky (like only applying to top 15), you'll be fine.
I'm not actually from Alabama, and I'm going to leave my home state schools out for anonymity. I applied to two and was accepted to the better one in October. I withdrew from the other one without completing the secondary and started withdrawing from other schools once I got that first acceptance at one of my top choices in October.
More details: -Strong leadership in extracurriculars (president of two clubs and exec-level in others) -Average/somewhat strong research (same lab since freshman year+different lab over summer abroad, 1 pub going into update letters) -Average shadowing/very weak clinical experience (~60 hrs shadowing, <20 hrs clinical) -Strong rec letters (according to interviewers...not sure about the committee letter) -Strong personal statement (according to interviewers' comments) -Variable secondary essays (depending on how much I hated the prompts and how much I felt like writing) -Strong upward trend in GPA (freshman year was rough, but everything after was great)
// Applications //
Application Cycle One: 06/02/2014
Undergraduate college: MIT
Undergraduate Area of study: Biological/Life Sciences
Total MCAT SCORE: 519
MCAT Section Scores:
B/B 130,
C/P 130,
CARS 129
Overall GPA: 3.78
Science GPA: 3.69
Summary of Application Experience
Submitted AMCAS 6/3/14, transcript received 6/9/14, AMCAS processed 6/25/14, LORs received 7/28, update letters sent to some schools post-interview 1/23/15 and later
I started getting interview invites starting in early August and began interviewing in September. I interviewed at my state school, Harvard, BU, Vanderbilt, Miami, NYU, and Duke during the fall semester, and UCSD, Columbia, and Stanford in January/February.
Applied, Withdrew
University of Colorado
Applying for combined PhD/MSTP? No
Submitted: Yes
Secondary Completed: No
Interview Invite: No
Interview Attended: No
Waitlisted: No
Accepted: No
Rejected: No
Summary of Experience:
Did not complete the secondary. I think I applied here to make myself feel better about spreading out my school choices.
Summary of Experience:
I got the secondary in late August, after getting my first couple interview invites, and by then I was too burnt out to write another decent secondary essay. Oh well.
Summary of Experience:
Applied out of guilt (because people keep telling me it's a good school, but I really don't think I'd go to Missouri unless it was my only choice).
Summary of Experience:
Not sure why I applied. I guess my thought process was like "I'm applying to Columbia, Cornell, and NYU...so why not Mt. Sinai too?"
Summary of Experience:
I have the sneaking suspicion that Harvard just really likes to interview MIT students. The interview day is very hands-off and they don't really care to try to impress you, because they don't need to.
I've heard some horror stories about the hierarchy/politics of the administration and faculty at Harvard, but the people I met there were pretty nice, so maybe it doesn't trickle down to the medical student level.
I have to say I'm disappointed that I didn't get in, but when I think about it, there's nothing special about HMS that makes me want to stick out 4 more Boston winters.
Summary of Experience:
Loved the area...so warm! Had my most terrible interview experience here though. A faculty and a student interviewed me at the same time, where the student just kind of sat there and watched/smiled/mostly grimaced. It was not a fun interview. I've heard other horror stories now about this interview, and I'm not surprised.
However, getting out early enough to go to the beach kind of made up for it. Priorities.
Summary of Experience:
So artsy I almost couldn't take it. But I had a fantastic interview experience. The only downside is the location, so far north of everything else in NYC.
Summary of Experience:
Interesting super-condensed preclinical year. The entire third year off to do research sounds nice, but it must be pretty stressful to cram for that entire first year. The students I met were cool, but I didn't really feel like I fit in with them. Almost everybody here is obsessed with sports, and I'm not even exaggerating.
The MMIs were ok. I probably didn't do that great, but I don't think Duke is at the top of my preference list.
Summary of Experience:
Wow, did not expect an invite this late (February). Was about to give up on Stanford. I won't get my hopes up too high since it's late in the cycle and they're rolling, but man would it be nice to live in the Bay area.
Realistically though, Stanford is pretty expensive and I've heard they don't give out great financial aid. They also have class all day four days a week, with Wednesdays off, which doesn't sound that appealing.
The big thing here is "MD+" students. Aka everyone who comes here is supposed to want to do more than an MD and do something interdisciplinary since there's so many other strengths that Stanford has on campus. Although this is sort of appealing, it also makes me have a gut reaction of "seriously, an MD just isn't enough for you?"
Summary of Experience:
The interview day was very professional and impersonal here so I'm not sure if I really clicked with NYU. It's in a great location though. 2/3/2015
I think Vanderbilt really likes MIT students. Had a great interview experience here with two really awesome faculty members. They seem to be working pretty hard to lure people away from the other top schools with their 3/4 tuition scholarships.
Vanderbilt is all about student wellness, and I think it's sincere. Nashville was also nicer than I expected, though I didn't get to explore much of it.
I probably won't end up attending, but I really wish I could.
Summary of Experience:
Dean Scholarship, but sadly that's basically nothing considering how expensive BU is. $5k does not make a significant impact on a COA of $76k...
Had a weird (in a bad way) interview experience. There are a lot of interviewees here on interview day, and some of the people I met were not so nice. I had a terrible interview with a faculty member who kept asking me about numbers. Why that's relevant, I have no idea. He did really emphasize how much BU cares about serving the underserved though, and actually follows through with their mission.
The faculty member who came to talk to us in the waiting room was really cool. She was a geriatrician and told us about how she makes in-home visits to the elderly and how flexible her job is, as well as how she handled having a kid in residency.
